The new Labour Government in Britain has made the reduction of childpoverty one of its central objectives. This paper describes the specificinitiatives involved in Labour’s approach and weighs them up in termsof their potential impact. After setting out the extent of the problem ofchild...

Children’s lives have been transformed over the past century. Family incomes haveincreased, children lead more solitary lives, attitudes to childhood have changed, newproducts have been developed and commercial pressures on children have increased.The importance of these commercial pressures...

UK government policy encourages mothers of young children in low-income families to enter or return to work, via tax credit subsidies and support for childcare. Maternal employment is seen a central plank in the campaign against child poverty, both because it raises income immediately and...

The concept of social exclusion has been widely debated in Europe butits application to children has seen relatively little discussion. What couldbe meant by exclusion of children is the first main theme of the paper.Among other things, I consider the choice of reference group, thegeographical...

The Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act(PRWORA) of 1996 represents a dramatic change in the US welfare state.One of its key goals was to move lone mothers, even those with youngchildren, from welfare to work. Early evidence suggests that, in concertwith a strong...

In October 1998, we convened scholars, policy makers, and practitionersto review what we know about the processes that affect childdevelopment and how we might wisely increase public and privateinvestments in children to promote both their well-being and theproductivity of the next generation....

Recent advances in brain research have provided new evidence thatearly experience matters and have greatly increased interest in theeffects of early childhood interventions on outcomes for children. Thispaper reviews what is now known about the potential benefits andpotential ill effects of...

This study uses data from the National Child Development Studyto examine how experiences during childhood are linked to a widevariety of outcomes in adulthood. A cluster of childhoodexperiences (poverty, family disruption, and contact with thepolice) are given specific attention. One of the main...

In the shadow of rising divorce and non-marital birth rates, nearly twothirdsof all American children today will live apart from at least one oftheir parents, usually the father. Clearly this astonishing proportion ofnon-resident fathers has serious implications for the economic,employment, and...

This study addresses three questions. Firstly, to what extent does divorceduring childhood have long-term consequences for the educationalattainment, economic situation, partnership formation and dissolution, andparenthood behaviour in adulthood? We show that in most of thesedomains children who...